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Now it can be told: Secrets of legendary 1976 San Jose freeway construction stunt revealed

October 20, 2013

San Jose city councilman Joe Colla and his '60 Impala. Photo by San Jose Mercury News

Freeway construction in the San Francisco Bay Area often takes place at a maddeningly deliberate pace, and the U.S. 101/I-280/I-680 interchange in San Jose spent much of the middle 1970s languishing with a big chunk of the flyover starting and ending in nowheresville. Then, one morning in January of 1976, a 1960 Chevrolet Impala appeared on top of "the highway in the sky," and a helicopter dropped off San Jose city councilman Joe Colla next to it, as a stunt calculated to jolt then- (and current) governor Jerry Brown into some sort of state-highway-funds action. Nobody seemed to know how this feat was accomplished… until now.

It turns out that union leaders and a crane company were involved in the stunt. Photo by San Jose Mercury News